The Wizards

We are excited to announce that the full release has successfully left Early Access with new stages, epic bosses and empowered spells for the ultimate wizardry!

We want to express our gratitude to everyone who trusted and supported us with feedback during Early Access. We are humbled that so many of you joined us on this exciting adventure.

The journey is not over though. In the upcoming months we will focus on preparing Playstation VR version of The Wizards, and during this process we will update Steam version of The Wizards with fixes, improvements and some new content.

We hope that you will enjoy exploring the richness of the full release update. You're invited to join our wizards community on Discord![discord.gg]

HIGHLIGHTS OF THIS UPDATE:

Completed story with new stages (Ruins 2, Ruins 3 and Desert 3)

Master Enchantments for all the spells (Yep. You can throw a shield now!)

Dynamic lighting from all the spells and improved performance

New cutscenes

Full Changelog:

Disclaimer: Due to changes in progression, all spell upgrades got reset and Spell Potential achieved on Ruins Stages 1-4 got taken away. Sorry for the inconvenience!

GENERAL CHANGES

Added two big bosses to hurl fireballs at

Major optimization of an entire game

All the spells are now casting dynamic lighting

Added new Fate Card - Easy Prey

Introduced Steam Achievements - Go get’em all!

Added missing translations and subtitles

Glass bottles are now breakable!

Campaign- Added some changes to lore and dialogues- Added cutscenes introducing missing story parts- Added stage summary while holding the stage glyph- Added fourth gem slot to the stage figures representing collected fairy shards- Tweaked points requirement for most stages- Telekinetic doors have been entirely removed- All Ruins levels have to be completed before unlocking next chapter

Ruins- Waveshooter stages has been moved from Campaign to Arena Mode- Added two brand new stages - Catacombs and Revenant’s Lair- Introduction of new gameplay mechanics and a new Fate Card- Pinewood intro cutscene has been updated- Stage 1 last combat around crystal is now a bit easier

Desert- Added region finale - 3rd stage with a boss fight- Ethereal crystals are now easier to remove from hands

Dungeon- Gameplay changes due to removal of telekinetic doors

SPELLS

Master Upgrades available for all six spells

After obtaining both basic upgrades Master challenge is unlocked - upon completion you will be rewarded with a Master Upgrade

Spells are now much more responsive and easy to cast

Improvements of spells visuals

Added vibration feedback while holding Fireball or Pyroblast

Frost Bow:

Master Challenge: Kill 2 enemies with a single arrow

Master Upgrade: Ice Volley - Shooting an arrow in the sky will cause a volley of arrows to fall wherever the previous shot from the bow landed

Fireball:

Master Challenge: Hit an enemy with two empowered fireballs within 1 second

We are excited to share with you that we are getting ready to release a full version of our game - and now we can say it officially:

The Wizards will leave Early Access on March 8th, 2018!

Upon full release, The Wizards will welcome you with lots of new content, improvements and bug fixes. Here are the most important changes and new features:

Two new stages on the Ruins

Final stage on the Shrike's Desert that will conclude the story

Boss fights with fearsome creatures

Wave-based Ruins stages will be moved to the Arena Mode

Master Enchantments - powerful upgrades for all the spells

Steam Achievements

We are very grateful for all the support we've got from you during the past seven months. We are humbled that so many of you decided to trust us an buy the game in its early stage. Now when the game is almost finished, we are convinced that it's your valuable feedback and patience that brought us so far. Thank you!

That's not everything we've prepared for you. Starting today, The Wizards officially supports LIV Mixed Reality technology! If you produce VR videos or streams, you can now use LIV client to capture MR in our game. And if you don't, please enjoy the following trailer we've prepared with LIV, and expect more goodies coming soon!

We would like to assure you that the full release will not be the end of our work on The Wizards. We will keep working on new features and improvements based on your feedback. Details on the new content coming after leaving Early Access will be revealed soon.

It's finally here! Left-handed mode, feature highly anticipated by ~12% of you, is now available in the game. We hoped to add this feature earlier, but it was much more difficult to implement than it may seem. Also, from this update owners of NVIDIA cards can take advantage of NVIDIA VRWorks™ that increase performance and allow for a new level of visual fidelity.

Right-handed players and owners of AMD cards - No worries, we still have you covered!

Last but not least, we’re happy to announce that The Wizards is now available on smartVR Store[store.smartvr-studio.com] all-in-one solution for VR arcades.

What's next?

We are getting closer to the full release of The Wizards. We've introduced most of the features and content promised for the Early Access. If everything goes well, full release will happen this March. Here are some of the things we are working on right now:

Moving wave-based stages (Ruins) from Campaign to Arena Mode

New exploration-based stages on Ruins to replace the wave-based ones

Final stage for Shrike's Desert region that will conclude the campaign

Steam Achievements

Please let us know how do you like the progress of The Wizards so far and what features do you think we should definitely add before leaving Early Access! You're invited to join our Discord server[discordapp.com] and share your feedback. You're also welcome to share your thoughts in a review.

Update 1.2.2 Changelog:

Left-handed Mode

Can be turned on while starting new campaign and in game's settings

Affects dominant hand for summoning spells and interactions

Does not flip movement/teleportation on the controllers. This can be changed separately.

Spells

Frost bow - Inverted upgrade order

Pyroblast - Scorched Earth upgrade now deals more damage over time

Added ring borders around spell selectors to indicate the level of the spell

We’re excited to share that Carbon Studio is joining forces with Nordic Trolls and Blackjard Softworks to offer you the Swords and Sorcery VR Bundle!

Our bundle contains The Wizards, Karnage Chronicles, and Dungeon Knight VR at discounted prices, offering you all the very best of high fantasy VR experiences with a combined average of 90% positive reviews. This exciting, all-in-one package delivers hours upon hours of adrenaline-pumping action and unforgettable adventures!

The bundle is flexible, meaning that if you own one or two of the included games, you can get the rest with even more discount. All the games are playable on HTC Vive and Oculus Rift and comes packed with movement options that suit the needs of everyone.

VR Dungeon Knight features co-op exploration in procedurally generated dungeons, while Karnage Chronicles delivers intense combat with RPG elements and story. These are games we couldn't recommend more! Adventure awaits!

We’re excited to let you experience brand new chapter of the game as an open beta - meet Shrike’s Desert! It’s a third story chapter of the game and one of our main promises for the Early Access. We’ve finished two stages of this chapter and decided to invite you to test it and share your feedback before we put the final touches to this section of the game.

The Shrike Desert is located in eastern Meliora. It is a lifeless landscape ravaged by dense, magic-fueled sandstorms. At the central point of the region lie the ruins of Shrike’s Lookout, an ancient sandstone fortress that has been torn apart by a violent magical explosion many centuries ago. The aftershocks of that explosion still resonate among the ruins, and allow ethereal phenomena to pass through the veil between worlds and haunt the area. Indeed a perfect spot to look for a villain…

Ethereal Phantoms - New Enemy:

Odd apparitions that roam the desert and come after any newcomer

Deal damage and are destroyed upon impact

Invulnerable to regular spells - can only be defeated with Ethereal Spears

Desert Serpents - New Enemy:

Enormous, semi-sentient guardians brought to life by an ancient spell that spring up from beneath the sand to hurl fire-based spells at trespassers

Can spawn anywhere on a mostly flat, sandy surface

Two attacks: a fiery orb similar to Pyroblast and a fiery barrage that rains from above

Ethereal Spear - New Spell:

New type of Ethereal Magic used to get rid of ethereal phantoms and barriers

Place your hand in the ethereal lantern to infuse yourself with the ethereal power which allows to summon Ethereal Spears

New Fate Cards:

Two new cards hidden in the desert regions:

Fortify: The player has more Time Synchronization points (multiplier: -0.25)

Fragile: The player has less Time Synchronization points (multiplier: +0.25)

Fixes and improvements:

Polished hit animations

Improved throwing with Fireball and Pyroblast while walking

Minor optimization fixes for Mountainpass Castle arena

Shamans’ projectiles are now homing slightly towards the player

Support for KAT WALK VR Treadmill:

From this update, The Wizards natively supports KAT VR treadmill. Ask your local VR arcade about it, it's a blast!

Game can also be played with WASD on experimental locomotion peripherals

What's next?

In the following weeks, we’ll be working on a third, final stage of Shrike’s Desert. It will be released along with some new content in the previous stages, thus expanding and fleshing out the story of you and Aurelius.

Many thanks for all the amazing support and brilliant suggestions we received from you! We invite you to visit our Discord server[discordapp.com] and share your feedback. We also encourage you to write reviews to share your experience with fellow players on Steam.